How to tell if you spend too much time playing MMOs

You’re in a difficult meeting at work, someone stands up and says “To hell with you guys, I quit.”, and the next thing you say is “Can I have your stuff?”

You rationalize playing for an extra 5 hours because then you’ll only be paying an even 10 cents per hour for the month!

A beautiful woman/handsome man asks you if you’d like to meet for dinner on Friday night and you say “Ooh, no, sorry, I promised my guild I’d be there to kill the Dragon of Darkness.”

Your guildmates know more about your work projects than your spouse does.

Your significant other says “Goodnight, honey” and you’re playing your MMO. They wake up the next morning and say “Good morning, honey.” and you’re still playing your MMO.

You spend hours staring at your clothes, thinking of how you might change them to make them “more bitchin.”

Your dog’s ears perk up when the computer plays the “quest completed” sound, and she starts wagging her tail excitedly.

Your boss tells you that you need to go on a weeklong retreat with no internet access, and you feel your insides writhing in terror.

You didn’t find the World of Warcraft South Park episode very funny at all.

One of your guildmates announces that they’re going to cut back on playing because they are getting married, and your first thought is “Loser.“

After months of relentless effort, you and your guild finally kill the one monster in the game that no-one else has ever killed. Then you discover, to your horror, that only hours before, another guild already did it, and they’re already posting screenshots of their win. You immediately start trying to figure out how they faked the pictures.

You find yourself saying things like “My online friendships are just as valid as my real-world friendships.”

The game goes down suddenly. You spend the next three hours hiding in a dark corner, muttering to yourself and rocking back and forth, back and forth, back and forth.

You find yourself often saying the following sentence: “No, I think you’re the one who’s addicted – to being a judgemental creep!”

You buy an extra computer and an extra subscription to the game, so you can play one character while the other one is healing up.

Your friend holds up a lamp that he pulled from a free pile at a garage sale.Â “Nice Loot!” You say, admiringly.

When your friends disparage your choice of gaming as your primary pastime, you look at them, smile smugly and say “You know, Joi Ito says that MMOs are the next generation’s golf courses.”

You sometimes forget that in real life, you can’t just respawn if you die.